


Ace

by Anythingtoasted



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Hospital, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-18
Updated: 2013-03-18
Packaged: 2017-12-05 18:06:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/726252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anythingtoasted/pseuds/Anythingtoasted
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>hospital!AU, stupid and schmoopy. Grumpy!Cas, nurse!dean, and lots of stupidity. ♥</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There's three 'official' parts to this, but honestly i'll probably write more :)

“I’m perfectly fine.”

His name is Castiel, and he’s been on Dean’s ward, making himself known, for what feels like about fifty years, now, but is in fact probably closer to a couple of weeks. He’s pretty much the definition of a terrible patient; he’s rude, he’s catty, he’s critical – he won’t eat the food they give him, he complains,  _loudly,_ at all hours of the day. He gets bored easily, rolls over sulkily when he gets tired of TV, and folds his arms like a disobedient child, staring resentfully at anyone who so much as looks at him.

He is also, coincidentally, Dean’s favourite.

Maybe it’s that he’s so easy to get a rise out of – maybe it’s that he refuses to believe he’s sick enough to be in hospital, and Dean admires his persistence; maybe it’s his ridiculous bedhead, or a combination of all three – Dean can’t put his finger on it, but he looks forward to seeing him all day, and even catches himself relieving other nurses of their duties ( _“No, yeah, I’ll do it, I can handle him, it’s no problem.”)_ in order to get a little more face-time with Castiel, who to everyone who meets him is simply an overly headstrong pain in the ass who for some reason can’t appreciate time off work.

Dean sees him everyday, and everyday he’s the same; reliable as the sun rising in the morning, Castiel will be sat upright, his face twisted in a haughty scowl, arms folded. He’ll look at Dean, mutter, “Hello, Dean.” With a sour, acid tone to his voice, and will allow – but only barely – Dean to check up on him. Dean will talk; Castiel will neglect to talk back, unless cajoled. Dean will grin at him and say goodbye – Castiel will look away, turn on the TV, and ignore him entirely.

So for the life of him, Dean can’t work out why he’s the highlight of his long, long shifts. There are more thankful patients; kinder ones, more interesting ones, too. All Castiel is, is rude, and surly, and prudish, refusing to engage in any kind of fun that Dean cooks up for him.

Maybe it  _is_ the bedhead, after all; maybe Dean’s just that simple.

Or maybe it’s the way, when Castiel thinks he’s not looking, sometimes the tiniest smile will alight on his face, and work its way up to his eyes, as Dean brings him his breakfast, every morning. Maybe it’s the way, just once, Castiel said “See you tomorrow.” instead of nothing at all. Maybe it’s the way Castiel’s laughter is _earned,_ the way he’s  _not_ easy, the way he’s a pain in the ass, that convinces Dean he’s worth taking care of.

But it could just as much be the bedhead. 


	2. Chapter 2

Dean is a professional.

He’s a good one, too; everyone around him is as  _qualified,_ technically, as he is, but still – some are better than others, and some are worse. Dean (modesty not being the issue) would place himself in the former category; he likes his job, he’s good at it, and he doesn’t get laughed at for having a ‘woman’s job’ as often as you’d think – “I’m a nurse”, he found out pretty quickly, works on a wide variety of women, in bars and clubs alike. Girls like a guy who’s got a good, steady job, and he doesn’t look bad in scrubs – but that’s not the point. Point is, Dean’s a  _professional_.

But the expression on Castiel’s face when the doctor says  _suppository –_ like he’s just swallowed something large and sharp and is wondering where to go in his life from here – still makes him laugh.  

The doctor moves on (but not before glaring darkly at Dean, her eyebrows high on her head, and – yeah, Dean’s gonna hear about that again, later), and he sits on the edge of the bed, almost chuckling again when Castiel flinches away.

“Calm down, man, someone else’ll bring it to you later. I’d have at least bought you a drink first.”

Castiel looks at him haughtily. They’ve been doing this dance for about – if Dean remembers right – three and a half weeks, now. It doesn’t get  _easier,_ per se, but it gets funnier. Especially since Castiel acts prissy about standard exams; grumbles around a swab when it’s pushed on him, and folds his arms and  _glares_ at the very  _mention_ of medication, food, or staying another week. Woe betide anyone who suggests he might need help going to the bathroom – the weight of his gaze would freeze the blood in their veins.

From what Dean can ascertain, they still have pretty much no idea what’s wrong with him; the guy’s got a fever; throws up more than is strictly necessary, has to be fed by IV and needs an inhaler on occasion just to get him breathing. He was admitted after fainting, and it could be almost anything, on that basis – could be a mutation of a virus, could even be almost nothing at all – but they keep him in, still, and Castiel gets more and more annoyed about it with each passing day.

Castiel sighs, deflating, and slumps against the sheets. “I’m going to get bedsores.” He says, out of the blue, and Dean snorts.

“Probably. You  _can_ get out of bed sometimes, you know.

He gets nothing but a derogatory eye, in response.

“Are you -  okay?” Dean asks – not out of obligation, completely, but because Castiel seems unnecessarily unnerved this morning; twitchy and jumpy and even more annoyed than usual by Dean’s mere presence. Castiel sniffs – and Dean prepares himself for silence, or  _I’m fine,_ or  _Why are you asking me questions, don’t you have a job to do?_ But instead the man in the bed in front of him – everything bleached white, white skin, white walls; eyes like two washed-out circles rimmed red-pink, blackish from tiredness; sighs even more deeply than before.

“I’m worried.” He says, distant, looking at his hands – at the admittance bracelet around his wrist. “I’m worried there’s something really wrong with me.”

Dean has heard this before. People are a lot more casual with him; they’ll say things to him they won’t say to their doctors. Ask the hard questions –  _will I die, will it hurt? Will I be alright, in the end?_  – looking for the yesses and the no’s that Dean can so rarely provide. There’s a set of guidelines on how he’s supposed to reply, a lot of the time. He gets by.

At this admission, though, he is left at a loss.

“You’ll be okay.” He says, after a moment of silence, and that cynical expression, almost a relief after the barren, aching worry that was on his face before, returns.

“Is that the medical term?” he says, and Dean laughs.

“ _Yeah_ , it  _is,_  actually.” He reaches across the bed, and Castiel doesn’t flinch away. He touches, briefly, the other man’s shoulder. “You’ll be fine. Honestly.”

He gets up, then – things to do, and Castiel doesn’t like him to hang around, as a rule – and as he leaves he hears, quietly, behind him; “Is that a promise?”

He turns, bracing a hand on the doorframe. “Yeah.” He says, nodding his goodbye.

Castiel, a black dot and blue eyes in a wash of white and pastels, frowns and looks down at his hands, again. “I’ll hold you to it.” He says, quieter.

Dean leaves him, but after a moment; after he’s stood in the doorway looking at this strange man, wondering what it is that’s so special about him. Realising that it doesn’t really matter; only that it  _was_  a promise, and he hopes he can keep it. 


	3. Chapter 3

The room is empty.

The blinds are open; the bedspread, starched and white, is folded neatly, tight, across the bed, and not a hair remains to suggest there was anyone there at all, let alone the hundreds and thousands of people who’ve drifted in and out of this place; but Dean’s not thinking about all of them, not the ones came before. To him, only one thing is missing, here.

He leans in the doorway and his heart sinks into his shoes.  He knows it was selfish to wish a person would stay sick, just so they would stay. He  _knows_ that. And feels like a bastard because he  _does_ wish it, all the same.

His fingers tighten on the doorframe. He thought he was  _getting somewhere_ with him. He thought,  _maybe,_ they were friends. Hippocratic oath be damned – Dean missed him like fuck already, missed his dully critical expression, his permanently furrowed brows. Everything.

But he can’t dwell for long; people are asking for him. He turns away.

———

The passing weeks go by like weeks do; he gets in for his shift early, he leaves late. He spends hours on the phone with his brother, telling him how he has no free time, no social life, and his brother nods dutifully along on the other line. He misses Castiel – but it’s more distant with every day. He forgets.

It gets to a point where Dean can’t remember his voice, anymore; can’t remember the way his hair looked, or what, exactly, it was he used to say whenever Dean woke him by barging into his room at six in the morning. The edge of derisiveness, the exact tone, is lost to him, now. He barely even feels it.

Castiel fades away, like so many other patients, a parade of faces, by turns sad, pitiable, blank, cheerful, angry. His recalcitrant manner and furrowed brows are lost in the sea of people, people, people that is Dean’s life, and he doesn’t even really realise it at all.

——-

Dean’s on the night shift in A&E dealing with drunks, mostly, and it’s a pain in the fucking ass trying to get things out of people –  _especially_ insurance information – when they’re fucking wasted. He’s been groped and puked on and bled on - even  _peed on,_ a little, and he just wants to go  _home._

He hangs, exhausted, in a deserted hallway, catching his bearings. His shift finishes at 7am; it’s 4.15.

He sighs so deeply that his whole body slouches; then he breathes in. Pushes himself up. Staggers upright. He walks out, back to the mess and chaos of A&E, and sidles up to the nurse’s counter.

“Who’s next?” he says to the nurse on duty, trying to keep the edge out of his voice. She glances at the computer screen and then looks out, over the low barrier that surrounds her desk, and points.

“Little guy over there.  Not sure what’s wrong with him yet; sickness and diarrhoea.” She shrugs. “Get his details, tell him to wait.”

Dean nods, and goes over. The little guy is sitting hunched over in a chair, his hair flopped in front of his eyes, clutching his stomach. Dean’s used to this sort of melodrama; he entertains it.

“Hey.” He says, and the little guy looks up at him. The corners of his mouth are strained. “You okay?”

“Do I  _look_ okay?”

Dean’s not in this mood for this, but he doesn’t have a choice. He passes the guy a form and a pen. “Fill that in. You got someone looking after you?”

The little guy nods. “Yeah. My brother. He’s gone to get a glass of water.”

Dean nods, absently – he turns to go – and then he stops.

Walking across the emergency room towards them, face scrunched up in annoyance (it  _is_ permanent, then) is Castiel. And this little dude – who, by the way, looks  _nothing_ like him – is his brother.

Dean tries, and fails, not to grin. “Cas?” he says. The guy – a paper cup full of water in his hand – looks at him. For a brief, terrifying moment, Dean thinks –  _he doesn’t remember –_ but he does. He does.

“Dean.” He says, quietly. And his expression – miraculously – softens. He passes the water to his brother; his brother doesn’t say thankyou.

Out of his hospital gown, Castiel cuts a different kind of figure; no longer weedy and shrunken, no longer sick, he looks – he looks  _good._ He puts his hands in the pockets of his windbreaker. It’s wet from the rain outside. “Hello, Dean.” He repeats, softly, and Dean realises he’s being  _shy._ He can’t help it – he grins wider.

“You okay?” he says, for a lack of anything else to say, and Castiel looks at him levelly, and nods.

“Better than I was last time I saw you.”

“Sure. Of course.” He bites his lip. He dithers. “This is your brother?” Castiel just nods. Dean nods again, awkward. “Uh.” He says. “It’s nice to see you again.” He has no idea what the hell’s come over him; he doesn’t like it.  He shuffles. “I guess I should go. Busy.” He gestures to the room – filled with coughing, mumbling, desperate people who he should be seeing to. But Castiel’s gaze has pinned him down. He coughs.

Castiel nods, absently, in response. “Of course.” He says, echoing Dean, from before. “It was nice to see you again, too.” He says, still looking Dean in the eyes – brow furrowed. Dean almost –  _almost –_ reaches a hand out for him to shake, then thinks it’s stupid (stupid, stupid,  _stupid)_ and nods, instead. Goes back to the desk, leaving Castiel with his brother.

He hears, behind him, as he turns away -  “ _That’s_ the nurse?” and maybe he smiles to himself. Maybe a little. But he doesn’t go back.

 ———————

Castiel and his brother leave – it was nothing, really, in the end – and eventually, when dawn breaks on the horizon, Dean’s shift comes to close.

He steps out into the bright spring sunshine, light a horrible and jarring contrast with the bluish halogen from inside – and he’s just about to go, bag shouldered, out of his scrubs, when the nurse from his desk – little lady, he doesn’t know her very well – taps him on the shoulder from behind.

“This was left for you.” She says, and hands him a piece of paper. He blinks.

“Thanks.” He says, mystified. She shrugs, and goes back inside.

Standing in front of the hospital with it clutched in his hand, Dean lets his bag drop on his shoulder and unfolds the slip of paper – it’s tiny, written on the corner of one of the forms they gave to everyone admitted to A&E, and there were words there, in tiny, neat, black little letters.

 _You could have just asked._ It said, without context. Beneath it, a phone number.

Dean closes his fist around it, and grins. He pulls his phone out of his pocket immediately – turns it on, punches in the number. Waits, hands trembling, for it to ring.

The voice on the other end is pissed as  _hell._ Dean has never been so happy in his life.

“It’s me.” He says, hand sweating on the reciever. He hears an exasperated sigh from the other end. A grunt of admission.

“Of  _course_ it is.” Another sigh. “What do you want  _this_ time?”

Dean grins so wide. He doesn’t think he’ll be able to  _stop_. 


End file.
